


Scymnus Diaboli

by Ione



Category: Devil's Cub - Georgette Heyer, These Old Shades - Georgette Heyer
Genre: Alastair family dynamics, Multi, Whigs vs Tories, Whites before the move, gender and cross-dressing quadrille, molly houses and famous streets of ill repute
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-20
Updated: 2011-12-20
Packaged: 2017-10-27 14:53:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/297035
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ione/pseuds/Ione
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five years ago at Eton, Dominic Alastair, Marquis of Vidal, thrashed George Ffolliot, and now Ffolliot wants the pleasure of vengeance. Leonie and Rupert come to the rescue . . . and Avon is his inimitable self.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Scymnus Diaboli

**Author's Note:**

  * For [rosekay](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosekay/gifts).



 

In the days thereafter, though rumor was rife, nobody proffered an exact accounting of the duel that fixed the notorious reputation of the Marquis of Vidal, son and heir to the infamous Duke of Avon.

The evening began without sign or portent: the Marquis of Vidal had joined his friend, the Honorable Charles James Fox, at White’s for an evening of hazard.

Not far away, in a large house lit for a ball, Sir Roger Pettigrew felt a hand clutching his satin sleeve, and looked in protest at his sister, who gazed raptly across the pink marble expanse at the ballroom door. “Lud! Who is yon Adonis, just come in with that horrid Mr. Colby?”

Sir Roger raised his quizzing glass. There among the newcomers were two familiar figures: the tall, hulking one was Thomas Colby, often seen around town, but the other—slim, well turned out in satin of pink and straw, his coat cut in the French style, his hair so pale that he had never worn powder— hadn’t been seen in London at all for near to three years. “That’s George Ffolliot,” he said to his sister as he made his leg. “Knew him at Eton.”

“Oh yes! Your old friend. An you love me, introduce us,” Miss Pettigrew whispered behind her fan.

Sir Roger was at a loss. How to explain? “His father, General Ffolliot, you know, is a brute,” he said as they began strolling the perimeter of the ballroom.

Miss Pettigrew turned on him a sapient eye. “I am not looking to marry the general, I believe.”

Sir Roger and his twin sister understood one another; since the age of discernment, they had often admired the same gentlemen. Her business was to marry well, and to the objective eye, Mr. Ffolliot must look quite a catch. For he was easily the most handsome gentleman in the very crowded ballroom, and everyone knew that General Ffolliot was amassing a fortune on the supplying and sending of the army to the colonies. Mr. Ffolliot’s prospects, therefore, were excellent.

But Miss Pettigrew perceived her brother’s hesitation. Roger had ever a kind heart, and hated to say anything untoward about anyone. “Another of your friends not in the petticoat line?” she asked.

To her surprise, he gave his head a tiny shake—having a care to his new ladder toupet, so thickly powdered a breeze might cause an embarrassment of snow to accumulate on his claret-colored silk coat. “Better if he hadn’t been,” he mumbled. “No, I mistake. Better if . . .”

His voice suspended, and there was no time for any more than that, for they’d reached the crowd around the new Adonis. He was, if possible, even more handsome up close, his features were very much in the classic mode, dominated by large blue eyes.

A shower of compliments—promises of invitations to come—and it was their turn. As her brother presented her, she watched the gentleman’s China-blue eyes travel idly over her before meeting her gaze. He made his leg—they said everything proper—his manners were excellent, but oh, of a coldness!

“ . . . never know what one should say in these matters, I protest,” Ffolliot was saying to Sir Roger. “Ought I to offer my commiseration or my congratulations, and if both, which is first?”

Sir Roger bowed again. “You’ll remember that my late parent had been ill a long time—quite despaired of by the faculty, so in a sense his death was a release. I trust the General enjoys his customary good health?”

The cerulean blue eyes widened, then shuttered as Mr. Ffolliot returned a polite answer, and the press of friends waiting for their chance to speak prompted the Pettigrews to move on.

Miss Pettigrew reflected on what her brother had said, and what he had not. She knew the novels of Mary Davys and Eliza Haywood, and though handsome rakes might be delicious to read about, she had no intention of belonging to one, and whyever was it that those same fellows everyone apostrophized as seraphs—angels—Adonis—were so frequently devilish in temperament? She wandered off to philosophize on this point with her friend Miss Carstairs, leaving her brother alone.

Sir Roger was looking for something to drink besides watery punch when he heard a step, and discovered Colby and Ffolliot at either side of him. Sir Roger repressed a sigh. He had never liked Colby, whose proclivity for violent sport had extended toward the other boys, excepting only Ffolliot, whom he had followed.  And (Sir Roger believed) and taken orders from, for Colby lacked not only Ffolliot’s beauty, but also his shining parts.

“Pettigrew, perhaps you can clear up a little mystery. Where is the card room?” Ffolliot asked.

“My aunt has recently come under the influence of the Countess of Huntington. No cards, and precious little to drink, except at supper, when my uncle will have the burgundy brought out,” Sir Roger replied.

“Prodigious little,” Colby muttered, with a meaning sneer.

“'twould be monstrous to malign any relation of yours, Pettigrew,” Ffolliot said with only a hint of mockery. “But waiting until supper for something to drink, it is insupportable. Are you fixed here, or will you stroll around to Whites to take a look-in? Do join us. It’s been an age.”

Sir Roger hesitated. He was damnably bored, but he’d promised his aunt he would squire unattached ladies to supper. However, that was at midnight, and it wanted several hours until then. Besides, he was curious. He knew that Ffolliot had been sent north after some scandal, but he had never heard what it entailed.

Ffolliot slid his arm through Sir Roger’s and drew him out of the ballroom. Pettigrew had ever been a pleasant fellow, and now he was a baronet, well-connected, and well-liked.  “You are fixed in town, are you not? Tell me the scandal,” Ffolliot said as they donned greatcoats and hats. “I hear that Fox is a fixture at White’s, now that he’s out of Parliament.”

Pettigrew remembered how much Ffolliot had hated Charles James Fox when they were at Eton. Somewhat discomfited, he waited until the lackeys had left them alone, and they had walked into the street. “You might have heard that Holland’s dead.”

“Both of them,” Colby agreed with a laugh, for now that Ffolliot was back in society, he hoped to see some good sport outside of their usual haunts. “But not before the fat one managed to get an heir, just in time to be sure his brother wouldn’t inherit the title.”

“ I would say that Fox’s prodigious good luck hath turned,” Ffolliot observed. “At last.”

At last? Pettigrew sighed as they dodged around a noisome puddle in the street. What was the fellow about? Surely he would not bore on about events when they were fifteen years old! Or it could be that the General had sent his son to reconnoiter for political purposes, as he himself was entirely caught up these days dancing attendance on Ministers?

They turned into Chesterfield Street, and soon found White’s as crowded as the ballroom had been at his aunt’s. The buzz was entirely absent of high female voices, the air filled with the smells of tobacco and wine.

Sir Roger bowed right and left, halting at the entrance to the chamber where hazard and faro were played. Ffolliot’s wide blue gaze took in the crowd around the hazard table. Sir Roger turned his attention that way.

Many of the gentlemen wore their gambling clothes—their coats either turned inside out or removed entirely, ruffles protected by leather greaves borrowed from their silver-polishing footmen. Some even wore wide-brimmed hats of straw in order to protect their eyes from the flickering light of the candles, the hats decorated with flowers and feathers to keep the wearers from being stigmatized as Quakers or Methodies.

In the center of the group stood Mr. Charles James Fox, larger than he had been at Eton, his expression of languid boredom giving no hint of any of the troubles he’d suffered these past three years.

Sir Roger dashed down his wine without tasting it, exceedingly puzzled. It was true that Fox had turned violently against his former party—and it was also true that Ffolliot and he had disliked one another at Eton. Why this interest now?

Colby took in Ffolliot’s spellbound gaze and gave a low, anticipatory chuckle.  “Sa-sa,” he breathed. This was better than he’d hoped.

The bottle was already empty. Sir Roger signaled for another, then peered past Colby’s big shoulder. A sudden shout, laughter and expletives mixed—the crowd around Fox shifted—and enlightenment dawned for Sir Roger.

Lounging in a chair, distinctive for his very lack of excitability, was the exceedingly handsome profile belonging to Dominic Alastair, Marquis of Vidal. He was not alone in being unpowdered—several gentlemen had taken off their wigs and draped them over the backs of chairs, the better to concentrate on the game—but few possessed hair of so glossy a black, above sardonic black brows.

There’s going to be unpleasantness, Sir Roger thought, heart sinking.

“Ecod,” Fox drawled for Vidal’s private ear. “ _La Belle et la Bête._ This place is become insupportable.”

“Why leave?” Vidal tossed back a glass of wine, and in setting his glass down, murmured, “Colby’s accepted everywhere.”

“His father’s West Indies empire and five thousand slaves is accepted everywhere,” Fox retorted. “And now his master hath escaped from the northern fastness.” He sighed. “Well, if they came looking for trouble, let us confound them by not giving it to them, shall we?”

They were speaking in the highly idiomatic French that one learned in Parisian court circles.

“Here, here,” said an aging beau, who had been elected to the Young Club before Fox and Vidal were born, and saw no reason to move over to the Old Club. “It’s beginning to sound like French moosoos in here. Or are you joining the Macaronis?”

Lord Jersey, the most _point de vice_ of the Macaronis, murmured wearily, “Peace, Alcibiades.”

And when the florid gentleman looked his way, Fox said dulcetly, “Huic maxime putamus malo fuisse nimiam opinionem ingenii atque virtutis.”

A shout of laughter rose from those immediately around Fox. But others were silent, and two or three evinced an antipathy toward Fox that hinted at political motivation, as someone said impatiently, “A main, a main, my lords. Pray, let us continue the game.”

As Fox handed Vidal the dice box for his turn as caster, an earl drawled, “Fox, if you must sharpen your wit upon us, do it in English, I beg of you. Reserve the Latinizing for the benefit of the Members, when you are there next.”

Colby nudged Ffolliot. “You know a better one. Go on, George.”

Mr. George Ffolliot sauntered toward the hazard table, saying softly, “Not all the wits were those approved by schoolmasters.”

“Such as?” Colby asked, always ready for sport.

 _“‘Those, whom my pleasures serve, I will requite;  
Henceforth Borastus, set the Nation free,  
Let conscience have its force of Liberty.’”_

It was clear to the more perspicacious among the gentleman gathered there that Ffolliot wore an air of expectancy, even triumph, as he awaited response. Behind him, Colby grinned with anticipation.

“Seven,” said the Marquis of Vidal, whose long fingers shook a dice box, followed by the rattle of a toss.

“Neither main nor chance,” observed the earl. “I’ll double he throws out.”

That led to a flurry of betting, as Colby said loudly, “Ecod, Ffolliot, damned clever. As well as apropos. Where had you that?”

Whereupon Mr. Ffolliot  stated to the company, “It is from the verse play _Sodom_ , written by Rochester, you know. I obtained a copy a month ago—paid a pretty sum, you can be certain, for it was outlawed.”

Fox doubled his own bet, then sighed. “My dear Ffolliot. I am desolated to inform you that you have been misinformed about its author.”

Ffolliot stared. “It states upon the very first page: Written by the E. of R. Which anyone may know stands for—”

Vidal rattled the dice box. And in Ffolliot’s direction, “Written by some scribbler named Fishbourne. Grandfather Avon knew Rochester. The earl was dead before that was printed.”

“The proof,” Fox leaned against the table. “is internal. Not everything Rochester wrote was obscene, but everything he wrote displayed wit. That play is merely obscene without a vestige of wit. I am desolated to inform you, Ffolliot, that you have been practiced upon.”

Ffolliot flushed angrily. “It’s beginning to sound like a damned schoolroom in here,” he commented. “If that’s to be the fashion, I’m for Boodle’s.”

“Where you will hear Hume holding forth,” someone observed, quizzing glass raised.

But several spoke up in support of Ffolliot, for many did not want to hear about plays, obscene or not. As for others, General Ffoliot was well known to be a friend to Lord North.

Young Westmorland, recently elected to the club though he had yet to grow hair on his chin, turned from one to the other. He was already wavering on his feet; goaded by a friend, he said to Vidal, “Wasn’t you rusticated from Eton?”

Fox drawled, “I wonder if I should tell you a story about Eton.” With a solicitous glance at Ffolliot, he added, “Though it is singularly unedifying.”

“No,” Vidal said, as he tossed another rouleau onto the table. “Damn it! I’m out.” He pushed away his hundred guineas, then passed the dice box to the earl as he said, “Everything about boys is singularly unedifying. Could be forgiven if it wasn’t also damned boring.”

More laughter, and glances Westmorland’s way, for though he’d recently succeeded his father, there were those who felt that anyone his age presumptuous by their very existence. The young gentleman placed his bet with a fair assumption of indifference, assuming with the self-absorption of youth that Vidal’s barb had him as target.

But he had not been the target. Vidal sat back. It was not his habit to bait the unworthy opponent, so he said to Westmorland, “Dr. Barnard and my father agreed that they had little more to teach me, so it was a mutual decision.”

Fox could not resist a good story. “It happened in Latin form, Westmorland. Vidal’d been to Italy with my father and me, you see, only he’d gone back to Eton in autumn, where he could not resist the impudence of speaking Italian well thickened with _us_ and _orum,_ which the master did not at first catch.”

Ffolliot had been drinking steadily; his rancor toward the marquis was clear to even the most unobservant. “Leading the way in everything,” he sneered. “Some things haven’t changed, I apprehend.”

Vidal ignored him. Fox ignored him. Some of the younger gentlemen murmured, sending speculative glances at Ffolliot, or at Fox, or at Vidal.

Sir Roger, who knew the history behind the bad blood, bethought himself of a way to give the course of conversation a different direction, by commenting on a ridiculous wager he’d overheard entered into Brooks’s betting book. For a time it looked as if he had succeeded in diverting the danger, for everyone had a story to tell, amid much mirth.

Then Sir Roger overheard Colby muttering to Ffolliot, “You’re letting that pricklouse Vidal run you off?”

Sir Roger’s attempts to distract Ffolliot had failed, so he tried another tack, and tapped Colby on the arm. “I see you are not betting. Would you like a hand of piquet?” He indicated the adjoining chamber.

Colby stared at him, then said belligerently, his words slurring, “No, by God, the sport’s right here—”

He paused at a sudden silence. Then Vidal said, “When and where you please.”

“Right here.”  Ffolliot whirled around, picked up a card from a deck on a side table, and held it up by its corner.

“Gentlemen—”

“My lords!”

Ffolliot ignored them all and backed to the wall, head thrown back, eyes wide. His prepossessing appearance caused a hesitation.

Without moving from the chair he lounged in, Vidal brought a pistol from his coat pocket. Light glinted on the heavy gold signet he wore on one long finger, then came the flash and report.

Again a silence, as everyone looked at the card—with a hole blown directly through the center. Then the voices broke out. "Damme! 'tis monstrous! I protest!"

At the inner door, the Duke of Queensberry appeared, face red with rage. At his shoulder was Mr. Walpole, eyes darting hither and yon as his grace demanded irascibly what the noise was, and if the younger men thought they were in an infernal, pox-ridden dockside pothouse?

Vidal then rose to his feet, flicked up a card, and held it out, but at that point several men rushed at Ffolliot, expostulating loudly.

Ffolliot spoke thickly past the surge endeavoring to remove the pistol from his hand, “Convenient, my lord. Convenient.”

“Where and when you please,” Vidal repeated, though his head was starting to swim.

“Fiend seize it, Dominic, you’re drunk,” Fox stated in an undertone.

“What of it?” Vidal retorted, furious not at the shouting, but at the tail end of a comment by Lord March, in response to someone else, “Yes, but Avon would have displayed more finesse.”

“Come along,” Fox urged, and Vidal allowed himself to be led from White’s.

The cold, rainy air hit him, clearing his brain enough for him to comprehend the enormity of his actions. “Damn it, Ffolliot goaded me.”

“Yes, Dominic.”

“There was no getting free of the fellow.”

“No, Dominic. But you did not have to shoot a hole in the wall at Whites. Why, what if you’d put a ball through some old dodderer’s wig? The walls are damned thin there.”

At this image, Vidal let out a short laugh. The moment of sobriety had passed, leaving him rather more giddy than before. Fox—not exactly sober himself—solicitously saw his friend to his apartments, then took a chair home.

o0o

Vidal woke to a splitting headache. He had no clear recollection of events, except one image remained: taking aim directly over the hazard table.  He called for his man.

Fletcher, who had been up half the night cleaning gunpowder from his young lord’s dress, appeared at the door.

My pistol, Fletcher?"

“It has been cleaned, my lord. Would you like me to fetch it?”

Vidal ignored the heavy irony, taking the words as proof: he really had fired off a pistol at White’s. Damnation!

Fletcher had known Vidal his entire life—the Avons had hired him away from his village inn to take over as major-domo for their son’s new lodgings. “Be damned to you, Fletcher,” Vidal said, though he knew that his mother would not like him addressing lackeys thus rudely. She was apt to say at such moments, _Me, I was once a page. You do not forget kindnesses, or unkindnesses_.

He was scowling over the tankard of ale that Fletcher brought to clear his head when a message arrived. His scowl turned to fluent cursing when he’d had a chance to peruse it: even with an aching head he detected the air of challenge, even scorn, under the polite words inviting Vidal to an evening of piquet, or whist, he could choose, and at Ffolliot’s rooms, where they would not be interrupted by Vidal’s watchdogs. He put it in French— _chien de garde_ —but dressing up mutton in French did not change it into a lamb.

Vidal hated Ffolliot, who was a sneaking tattler, and worse. He knew that Ffolliot hated him as much. Probably more, Vidal thought, reflecting on their last encounter but one, and grinning. So he was coming back for more? _I’ll give it to him_.

He dashed off an answer, gave it to Fletcher to have delivered, then sat down to breakfast. Halfway through, he was beginning to feel somewhat more human when there was a loud banging at the front door that echoed through the house.

Vidal sighed, recognizing that impatient knock; though Fletcher was under orders to never let anyone in, Vidal was not surprise to hear his Uncle Rupert’s voice, “No, damme, I know the way. As if my nevvy would turf me out!”  And a moment later the man himself appeared, tall, still handsome in a florid way, his hat tucked under his arm until he tossed it carelessly on the table, where it fetched up against Vidal’s tankard.

“There you are, Vidal. I had to get a look at you myself—the first of us Alastairs to blow a hole in the wall of a club. No doubt your father has half-a-dozen gabsters pouring the news into his ears right now.”

“My father is returned from Paris? Of course they are back from Paris,” Vidal said, grimacing. There was no hiding anything from his father. Not that he would. But he’d hoped enough time would pass so that the worst of the talk would blow over. _Finesse_. Damn it to hell!

“That’s why I’m here. Behold in me your mother’s envoy. They are holding a soiree tonight—nothing formal—to hear the news. Fan will be there—coming out of mourning at last—and she’s bringing her brats.” Rupert made a comical face. “Though stap me if that don’t keep you away! The girl is a pretty little thing without an idea in her head, but as for that boy of hers—!”

“Cousin John will have much to say about what happened last night.” Vidal added grimly, “However, he knows better than to say it to me.”

Rupert gave a crack of laughter. “So I’m to say you’ll be there?”

“Present my compliments to my mother, but I’m promised elsewhere.”

“So you don’t go,” Lord Rupert said with the ease of long habit. “Blister me, they can’t clap you up for foregoing some damn party.”

“It’s not a party, that is, I suppose it is. Piquet. Hosted by Ffolliot, who would impute the wrong reasons, damn him, if I didn’t turn up.”

“The general’s sprig is in town? Wasn’t there some scandal? Something about a whore?”

“Never listen to scandal.”

“You just make it,” Rupert retorted, with too much enjoyment to be objectionable.

“Whatever it was, the General hushed it up, and Ffolliot was bundled to their place in the north. Not long enough, if you ask me.”

“Ah. No friend of yours, then. A challenge, is that it, young fireater?”

“I despise Ffolliot, and I believe I gave him reason to hate me,” Vidal said, grim again. “Ffolliot put his infernal invitation in such a way I couldn’t turn it down. But I don’t mean to give him the entire night. Pray tell my mother I will join you before supper.”

Rupert was struck by an idea. “Fiend seize it, why not tell her yourself? You know she’d be glad to see you.”

 _Finesse._ Vidal would face his father when his head ached less. “I would, and gladly, but I promised Fox and Carlisle I’d look in this morning. Carlisle wants my opinion on the cattle he’s thinking of buying off Trevelyan. He has to sell up, you know.”

Lord Rupert drank off the rest of Vidal’s ale, snatched up his nephew’s napkin to wipe his mouth, then picked up his hat. “Very well, boy. I’ll carry your message. Be sure to fleece him,” he added at the door. “If the boy is half as abominable as his father—”

“Worse,” Vidal said. “Worse.”

o0o

The fact that Vidal abominated Ffolliot added to the sense of challenge. He had discovered within this past year that, unlike his friend Charles, he was not excited by games of pure chance. Where was the fun in watching a drunken, witless sot win on the turn of dice? He played because one must, but his passion was reserved for games of skill.

His father had seen to it that he was an expert at whist and piquet by the time he went off to school. “If you must lose,” his grace had said, “let it be to a worthy opponent. Otherwise you have merely proved that you are the bigger buffoon.”

Vidal had played not only against his grace, but against Hugh Davenant, who in some wise he had regarded as another uncle while he was growing up. As a result, he’d seldom lost, and so it was with a sense of growing anticipation that he set out for Ffolliot’s lodgings that evening, on a night wreathed with fog.

He had expected to face excellent players. He had hoped to find Charles Fox there, no doubt to be fleeced as well. But when Ffolliot welcomed him with a flashing smile, even a triumphant smile, Vidal discovered that Fox was not there, not even Sir Roger Pettigrew, who had been friends to both in their Eton days.

The company was comprised of Ffolliot, Colby, and several others, including some older men, some of whom he’d been introduced to. He only remembered them as former members of Fox’s party, now political enemies, but as he had no interest in politics, he merely made his leg, uttered polite noises, and made certain to take a chair where he could see the clock on the mantelpiece, so he would not be obvious when consulting his watch.

Since there were eight guests, they settled down in two tables. Vidal drew as partner an older man unknown to him, wearing green satin, and a bagwig whose powder smelt strongly of orris. Wasn’t he someone in the ministry? Vidal shrugged. He hated politics.

A servant brought wine, and they settled in to play. Vidal had brought a certain amount of money; as soon as he lost it, he could take his leave. If he happened to win, he could declare that he would not fleece his host, and depart.

The first trick or two went to Vidal and his partner. He drank heavily, as did everyone at the table, but by the second and third game, he noted that though the other men at the table sipped, no one except him finished a glass. Also, though his partner handled the cards deftly, he was a reckless better, and they went down heavily, slammed and capotted repeatedly, so he was glad when Ffolliot declared that they would change partners.

Vidal had lost most of his guineas when the points were reckoned up again; he was about to take his leave when Ffolliot, with that air of challenge, suggested a hand of piquet.

The room was silent, everyone watching the tall, black-browed marquis. Damn he was a handsome buck, though arrogant; Ffolliot’s heart beat fast. There would be such exquisite pleasure in destroying him!

All was in readiness. Bolstered by Colby’s grin of anticipatory glee, he gestured toward a table, his air a masterpiece of insolence.

Vidal’s head swam; even though he’d slowed down, he had still drunk too much wine. He said, “I’ve only a couple of guineas left. Poor sport.”

Ffolliot’s eyes widened. Vidal remembered that mad stare. It was always before Ffolliot did something wild. “We’ll stake other things,” he said. And smiled wider. “Afraid to play a hand with me?”

“Not afraid to do anything,” Vidal retorted.

Colby uttered a coarse laugh. Vidal flushed, sensing something afoot, though he could not say what was amiss.

Ffolliot refilled his glass with solicitous mockery, murmuring, “But you do not drink. Is there aught amiss with my wine?”

Vidal recklessly drank down the burgundy. “Deal, if you please,” he said. “Name your stake.”

Ffolliot’s lips parted. _He was waiting for that_ , Vidal thought hazily. But all the guests were crowded around as Ffolliot dealt. “You once,” he said softly, “honored me with a remonstrance. Lose, and I will return the honor.”

 _A thrashing?_ _Let him try_ , Vidal thought. “Done. And if I win . . .”

Ffolliot bowed across the table. “You shall choose.”

Vidal blinked the blur from his eyes, concentrating on the cards. As Elder hand, he could discard first. Getting rid of low cards, he claimed three.

“Point of four.”

“How many?”

There was no sound but the tick of the clock on the mantel, the soft flick of cards, and the ring of a glass being set down. Vidal watched carefully; every time he looked at his cards, he was aware of those blue eyes lifting, but when he raised his gaze, it was to find Ffolliot studying the game.

After a few tries he spotted the direction of Ffolliot’s glances: at Colby. Vidal lounged back in his chair, lifting his wine glass so that he could better see, but the men around him shifted, and once again Colby had drifted just out of sight, but Vidal could hear his heavy breathing.

The sense that Ffolliot was somehow cheating became conviction just before Ffolliot declared, in triumph, “Ripique! Ripique and capotted, my lord.”

“You cheated,” Vidal discovered.

The company laughed, and someone muttered about fools who could not hold their wine. Vidal slewed around, and there was Colby, standing by the mantel. But Vidal knew the fellow had been standing directly behind his chair. Angry, he looked around, to find disbelief, scorn, and derision in every pair of eyes.

Ffolliot opened his hands. “I beg of you,” he said to the gathering. “Did you see me cheat? Did you, Colonel?”

The Colonel so addressed, a young man splendid in his regimentals, stated portentously, “ _I_ saw fair play.” Then he flicked his snuff box open, took a pinch, then dusted off his sleeve before saying, “But damme, if Satanas’s son cannot meet his obligations, he no doubt has enough friends to cry out their objections in Parliament.”

After the laughter this bon mot raised, Ffolliot turned to Vidal, his wide blue gaze quite mad.“If you are shy,” Ffolliot drawled. “Why, we will declare this matter at an end.”

“No,” Vidal said, though his belly trembled, sweat poured cold down his back. They were in it together, but in what? He could not believe that no one had seen anything, that they would doubt the word of an Alastair. Yet he could not fight the room, he knew that much: to protest more was to make himself a laughingstock. Furious, he fixed Ffolliot with a narrow glare. “I’ll fight you when and where you please.”

Ffolliot’s lips parted on a soft laugh of triumph. He bowed, his fair locks falling forward. “Then let us settle this now.”

“We shall see fair play,” the Colonel stated, bowing.

Vidal’s blood was up. “Name your place.”

A shout went up at the prospect of sport, coats were fetched, the company set out. A couple of hackney carriages pulled up with such speed that Vidal suspected they had been waiting; Ffolliot indicated one with mocking politesse. As soon as Vidal climbed in, Colby, the Colonel, and two big men Vidal had never seen before crowded in with him into a second coach. Ffolliot was last.

The coaches set out, rattling up narrow lanes—but within a street or two, the one Vidal was in unaccountably took a turning away from the direction the other was heading.

Colby licked his lips and grinned. “Now we will see _fair play_ , my lord,” he said with such vicious anticipation that Vidal whirled off the bench.

And the others were ready for him. The fight was short, all the more desperate for being conducted within the extreme confines of a coach. Vidal’s fist connected with Colby’s eye, his other got a grip on one of the men struggling to pull him back, but the grip was on a wig, which came away, sending a cloud of powder into the air—and white lightning struck his skull and scoured out his eyes, leaving blackness blooming.

Hearing faded more slowly: the last thing he heard was Ffolliot’s voice, “Have a care, Colby. He keeps a pistol in his coat pocket.”

Then nothing.

o0o

As often happened, Lord Rupert had forgotten all about his nephew’s prior commitment until he chanced to look up from the card table, and saw his sister-in-law’s sad eyes. He was very fond of her grace of Avon.

He’d already drunk a great deal, of course. So it took time to work through his brain. He swung around, and there was Avon, listening to something Lord March was saying to Mr. Selwyn, which caused a spurt of well-bred amusement. Rupert had never been able to read his devil of an older brother, but a careful squint through his quizzing glass didn’t reveal that infernal look about those pale eyes that meant trouble. Not that Leonie would be the cause. Rupert grimaced; never in his life had he seen a pair like them, but they had the decency at least to keep the billing and cooing behind closed doors.

So the trouble, whatever it was, wasn’t between them. And there was Fanny, sitting in a circle of chattering females as a servant took around little cakes on a tray. The girl Juliana had ensconced herself in the window alcove, flirting with some young sprig, and young John was well on the other side of the room, gabbing to another prosy young bore.

No trouble in sight from any of ‘em, which left—

“The devil fly away with Vidal,” he muttered.

Never had a game of whist seemed to take so long. But at last the last trump was declared, the points counted up, and Rupert rose from his chair, saying he had to stretch his legs.

He made his way to Leonie, who looked like a girl in a polonaise of blue and white, with trimmings of silver silk _en platitudes,_ her coiffure very simple—no more than a diamond-studded lace and ribbon confection at the back of her arrangement of red curls, as Avon liked her to go unpowdered. Lady Fanny more than made up for her sister in law: perhaps because of the sedateness of her mourning dress of dove-gray satin, her coiffure was an elaborate wig _à la marmotte_ over a _hérisson,_ bound with a gray ribbon _en barrier,_ after Leveillé.

“He’s bound to be here soon,” Rupert said in a low voice. “Promised me.”

Leonie’s great blue eyes rose, and Rupert knew he had it right. “Dominique finds his friends _fort amusant_. _Ma foi!_ It happens, another year and some months and he will turn twenty. He must go his own way.”

“Piffle,” Rupert declared. “Besides, he hates Ffolliot. That I’d swear to. Felt obliged. No, I think he said challenged, didn’t he? I thought it damned strange at the time—”

“ _Mordieu!_ Why did you not tell me this before?” Leonie demanded.

“What with one thing and another, it fell out of my head. Then, you know my memory after I get a bottle or two into me—blister it, Leonie, I’m not a damned secretary.”

Leonie’s expressive black brows twitched into a line. “Ffolliot. Was there not a terrible scandal, oh, two or three years ago? I do remember this Ffolliot, he was _not_ a friend to Dominique. I could see that, me, when we visited Eton. Though a _very_ handsome boy,” she added judiciously, in an effort to be fair.

Rupert shrugged.

Leonie snapped her fan open, peeped across the room, then raised it to obscure her face. “Monseigneur is disappointed. He says nothing, he shows it not, but I can feel it, oh!” She touched the expensive Mechlin lace at her bosom. “I shall send a footman to fetch Vidal.”

Rupert had an idea. He was already bored—he never played for high stakes in his brother’s house, and the talk about the latest plays in Paris, some book or other that had them all laughing, Mr. Franklin’s _bon mots_ —left him at sea.

“A footman will blab,” Rupert said. “I’ll fetch him.”

His reward was a look of gratitude. “Will you, _mon vieux_? Oh, you are vastly good, Rupert.”

“Devil a bit,” Rupert rejoined. “Back in a trice, see if I don’t.” It was on the tip of his tongue to offer a wager against himself, but he forbore, and soon took his leave, walking out into a foggy night.

It took a little time to find out where young Ffolliot lived, then he walked there, turning over in his mind various ways to extricate his nephew without causing talk. But when he arrived in the quiet street, it was to find the front part of the house entirely dark.

Rupert raised his cane and rapped at the door until a porter showed up, holding a lantern. A demand to know where Ffolliot was elicited the uninformative response, “Don’t know.”

“Blast you, man, was there a party here this evening, or was there not?”

“There was, but they climbed into rattlers and went off, not ten minutes ago.”

“What? Where did they go?” Rupert saw the shoulders coming up and proffered a guinea.

The man looked from that to Rupert, his expression clearing. “Don’t know. But I did overhear the tall one saying something about seeing some sport, when he told the hired coachmen to stand off down the street there, a-waitin’.”

The guinea changed hands, then Rupert hailed a chair, and promised them double if they’d put some speed into it. Then, as the chairmen jolted him through the streets back to Avon House, he gnawed the carvings on the handle of his cane as he considered the surprising news.

As it happened, he knew young Ffolliot by sight: three years before, he was a startlingly handsome boy who had a taste for a certain establishment that Rupert himself occasionally frequented. So Rupert suspected what sort of sport Ffolliot was likely to be found indulging. But he would lay any amount that Vidal didn’t share those tastes.

When he regained Avon House, he’d thought it all out. He knew that Avon would only have to clap eyes on him and he’d see everything inside Rupert’s skull, damn him, so he betook himself to the garden entrance, surprising the servants, and sent them about their business, saving old Gaston, who could be trusted. Gaston, he bade fetch their mistress.

Leonie appeared in a rustle of skirts. “ _Voyons_ , what is this, Rupert?”

Rupert told her.

Leonie nibbled a finger-tip, her expressive black brows knit into a line as she considered. “There is something I do not like in what you say, Rupert.”

“Hey,” the exasperated lord began to protest. “Here’s me walking all over London, and in a damned fog, too—”

“ _Tais-toi, imbecile_ ,” she exclaimed, an expression Rupert had heard too many times over the past twenty years to heed. “A card party with this Ffolliot, the house shut up, Dominique gone off _si soudainement_ . . . I think there is trouble.”

“Devil a bit,” Rupert said. “Boys do these things, y’know, Leonie. Even your Dominic is going to kick up his heels. ‘tis the age. They all do it.” He grimaced. “Except perhaps for that prosy young bore Fan produced. Damme, times out of mind I’ve been glad he ain’t an Alastair. D’you know what he up and did just this evening, Leonie? He starts in about some Thomas Paine. Pain is right—”

Bah!” Leonie waved her hands impatiently. “Dominique is wild, _mon Dieu_ do I not know! He is very like me, _mon cher_ Dominique. But he has never broken a promise, and especially, when we have been away so long.” She clapped her hands lightly once. “I will not have Monseigneur to think that Vidal is gone to a _maison de joie_. . . to a bawdy house, in preference to us. _Faute de mieux_ , I shall investigate myself.”

Rupert gasped. “The Duchess of Avon can’t step into one of those places.”

“So Madame la Duchesse will not. Instead, it will be Leon the page.”

“Leonie . . . not in those places.”

Some of the sparkle dimmed from the great blue eyes. Leonie lifted her chin, which was still maintained its youth, notwithstanding those near-to twenty years. “Do you not think I saw such things—and worse, when I was with Jean? _C’est fini, tout cela_. I will go, and you will take me to this place where Ffolliot takes my Dominique. And we shall see. Wait here! Do not go into the salon, for Monseigneur will take one look and know something is amiss.”

“He will if he sees you, too,” Rupert said shrewdly.

“Do I not know? So I shall leave a message with Gaston, if Monseigneur asks. He is very well placed just now. He might not notice we are gone, if we are quick. I will send you some refreshment while you wait. But do not linger over your wine, for I shall return _tout de suite_.”

Rupert was grateful for Leonie’s thoughtfulness, even if she was still a damned wild piece. He settled back with a glass of Avon’s excellent wine, putting no faith in ‘quick’ when it came to female dress. So he was startled almost into dropping the bottle as he poured his second glass when a diminutive young fellow appeared before him, wearing an exquisite French court dress of the fashion five years previous, and a plain tie wig on his head. Under his arm he carried a French hat; Rupert’s gaze went from the hat to the neat boots and the sword at the fellow’s side to those great blue eyes, and his jaw dropped.

“It is Dominique’s dress from when we presented him to the king in Paris. He grew out of it in a month,” Leonie added. “But I kept it because he had looked so handsome. And he was just my size,” she added. “The wig, I took from the footman. I said you needed it for a wager.”

Rupert laughed, set down the wine, and said, “Let’s go out the kitchen way. We don’t need the entire house blabbing about this.”

“Ah, bah! The servants are used to seeing me in my trousers, when I fence with Monseigneur or Dominique. But not,” she admitted, “when I am giving a party.”

o0o

His grace of Avon had noticed the quiet expectation in his duchess gradually alter to an unhappiness whose cause was no mystery. All around him he was used to hearing people deplore the habits of modern youth: trite expressions, uttered with mournful sighs, to which he seldom troubled to respond. He also knew the propensities of his own bloodline, and so, in spite of helpful advice offered by well-meaning friends—and those who were not friends—he had given his son a light rein, to the extent of permitting the boy to set up his own household when he turned eighteen.

Wild as Dominic was, there were certain standards that Avon had exerted himself to inculcate. He believed the boy understood them. It was apparent this evening that he did not.

He continued to entertain his guests, signaling by a glance when food or drink should be offered; as he did, he watched Rupert talk to Leonie, then vanish. After an interval, she received a message, made her smiling way around the room, then also vanished. And had not returned.

Presently he contrived to catch Gaston in the alcove between the salons. “Her grace requested you to say . . .?” he prompted.

Gaston’s face stiffened, which told Avon what he wanted to know before the man said, “Lord Rupert required a moment of her time. Something about a wager.”

“No doubt,” Avon drawled, and continued on through to the kitchens, considerably startling his servants. He walked through, to the little room at the back where the servants had their own salon. There he found a bottle of the good wine, and a cut crystal glass, half full.

He made his leisurely way back to the salon, pausing to survey the company, which had broken into several groups, conversation here, cards in the far room. The buzz of conversation had not changed in tone, giving the duke to understand that everyone bethought themselves their hostess was elsewhere.

He signaled to Hugh Davenant with his eyes. Mr. Davenant had discovered them in Paris on his return from Italy, and had accepted their invitation to accompany them back to London. A magnanimous gesture, the duke reflected, which was to pay for itself with unexpected promptitude.

Davenant evinced only mild curiosity. “Justin?”

“There is something amiss with Vidal,” the duke said for Hugh’s private ear. “Enough to send Rupert to the rescue. And, I strongly suspect, Leonie. I go to investigate. Might I request you to cover for us, and if our absence should be discovered, contrive excuses for us?”

Hugh Davenant bowed. “I live to serve, Justin. I live to serve.”

Avon was gone on a quiet laugh.  He took enough time to discover that none of the Avons’ chaises had been put to, then set out for Vidal’s house. There, he roused Fletcher as one who had the right, and in a brief exchange, discovered whence his son was to have gone.

A very short time later, he gazed from the window of a hackney coach at the darkened house, then gave the order to be conveyed to Chesterfield Street.

o0o

Vidal roused slowly, hearing voices he disliked. Red pain throbbed behind one eye. A different sort of pain—call it orange—radiated from his shoulders, elbows, and wrists. A duller, blue sort of pain throbbed to his heartbeat in his fingers. His hands were bound behind him. He was shivering with cold: they’d taken away his coat, leaving him in the silken waistcoat and shirtsleeves.

He sorted the voices. He recognized that loud bray—Thomas Colby. He never would have gone into a coach with Colby, but the jolting and sounds, the scraps of memory, insisted he had. With relentless speed the scraps combined into enough of a whole to restore the gist of his movements: the card party. The cheat. The challenge. The coach.

How many others had crowded in? Ffolliot. Colby. Some fellow in regimentals. Weren’t there a couple of others?

He tried to breathe slowly against the pain and rising nausea burning his throat, as he endeavored to ascertain the whereabouts of everyone. His coat being gone meant that his best pistol was out of reach. With his hands bound, he could not tell if they’d found the small one he’d tucked into the waistband of his trousers.

“Damn it, Ffolliot, how far is this place?” Colby demanded.

“We are nearly there. How hard did you hit him, Thomas? I trust we will not have to wait all night for our very dear friend to awaken. I want him awake and aware.”

“Just a love tap behind the ear.”

Vidal chose that moment to act. He kicked out with both feet, catching Colby in the face, and Ffolliot in the body. A twist— he brought his head down hard onto someone’s elbow, causing an explosion of cursing. Another twist, a kick at the coach door, which swung wide—then many hands flung him onto the coach floor, someone’s hands round his throat. Feet and fists bloomed red pain all over him—he couldn’t breathe—choking—when Ffolliot shouted, “I won’t have him harmed. He’s going to be awake.”

The hands loosened, and Vidal’s body reacted as violently as his attackers had: he vomited a stream of foul wine and food over Colby.

And then blackness.

o0o

The hackney pulled up before a discreet-looking house in Drury Lane. In spite of (or perhaps because of) the late hour, the street was filled with people, from the sounds, mostly drunk. Leonie looked at flushed faces revealed by the pitch torches, and turned her nose into her sleeve as she followed Rupert up the steps. _Incroyable_ , how one changes! Once she had lived with such smells every day.

An enormous porter let them in, after recognizing Rupert, and here there was more noise. In the brightly lit common room women in satin striped gowns, their bodices low cut, disported with a large number of gentlemen.

An enormous woman approached Rupert. “My lord! It has been an age, I protest. And who have we here?”

“One of my French nevvies,” Rupert said before Leonie could speak. “Armand, meet Madam Ticklecheek, the proprietess.”

“And how many I be of service for you, my lord, and Moosoo Armand?”

Rupert glanced around in so covert a fashion that if anyone had been paying him the least heed, he would have raised curiosity. Rupert produced his last guinea, pressed it into Madame Ticklecheek’s hand, and said, “I’m actually seeking a young friend. I’ve seen him here. We were supposed to be part of his party, but we’re late. Mr. Ffolliot?”

Madame Ticklecheek pushed the coin back into Rupert’s hand, and her jovial manner dropped. “He’s been forbidden this place, my lord. If you take the advice of a woman who’s seen as many summers as you have, you’ll not mix yourself up with that young fellow.”

“Any idea where he might have gone?” Rupert asked, his hopes quite dashed. Until now, this had been a sure thing—he’d been congratulating himself on his cleverness.

“Go ask Madam Rosette over in Westminster. Your young gentleman,” the word came out with heavy sarcasm, “might not favor their custom as bloody enough, but she knows everyone in our world.”

“That she does,” Rupert said, and once again attempted to press the guinea on the hostess. “For your silence.”

“You needn’t pay me for that,” she said frankly. “I’ve a notion that no good can come to my custom knowing anything about the one you’re looking for.”

As soon as they reached the street again, Leonie said fiercely, “If this Madame Rosette knows so much, why did we not go there first?”

“Because I ain’t dressed for it,” Rupert said with an uncomfortable air. Then he sighed. “The truth is, I like a spot of topsy-turvy, and what’s more, it’s your fault, you and your Leon.”

“ _Quoi?_ ” Leonie responded, too amazed to remember her English.

Rupert forbore explaining, but she discovered the truth soon enough. Once again they approached a house indistinguishable from its neighbors, and had to pass a sizable brute of a doorkeeper, after Rupert paid him and murmured something.

The lower rooms were fitted up in the very latest fashion, with satin wall hangings, fine Chippendale furnishings, an ormolu clock on the marble mantel. The clock appeared to be made of solid gold.

The salon was full of ladies. Their voices sounded odd to Leonie’s ear. One approached them, frowning in Leonie’s direction.

“You know that _gentlemen_ are not permitted,” this lady said in a mellow voice that reminded Leonie of a musical instrument. The lady herself was very tall, powdered and rouged and patched, her skirts enormous, perhaps to contrast with a thick waist, and wide shoulders that her ribbons and lace could not quite obscure. “I shall have to speak to my porter—”

“Paid him a guinea to let us in, Madame Rosette,” Rupert said. “Look you, I ain’t got time to change. If I could have two words with you in private?”

Madame Rosette affected surprise. She raised her quizzing glass, revealing a chin that, underneath its thick powder, showed a surprising stippling of whiskers poking through, and Leonie had it—this was a man dressed as a woman. A new Chevalier d’Eon!  Leonie had met the gentleman—now a lady—and had sympathized with the Chevalier’s plight as a result of the late French king’s foolishness.

“Wait here,” Rupert murmured into Leonie’s ear. “Rosette will talk more if you ain’t by. You’ll be perfectly safe,” he added with a grin.

Leon tripped into the salon. Now that she looked, she discovered a masculine shoulder under this gown, a rather lantern jaw ‘neath the powder there. The voices, ah la! No wonder they sounded odd—these were men dressed as women, using female voices.

“I protest,” one of them said to Leonie, her fan hiding one eye. “This gathering is select.”

Though Leonie remained anxious about Dominique, she could not help but enjoy the situation. She executed her most practiced bow. “Excuse me, Madame. Only the exigencies of need cause me to trespass in this way,” she said grandly.

“But you are French, young sir,” another of the company declared. “Oh, have you been to Paris?”

“I am just returned,” Leonie responded.

At once the party demanded to know what plays were being seen, and the latest fashions. These questions Leonie could answer, with specifics about ladies’ toilette that her auditors listened to with interest.

And so Rupert found her talking in French, debating the excellencies of the new coiffure _à la queasco_ as opposed to the _pouf_. But when she saw Rupert, she leaped to her feet, and flew to the door.

 “What news _, mon vieux_?” she cried, her voice so high that many of the company were left wondering if the young monsieur might have had his own secret identity.

As soon as they stepped into the street, Leonie said, “You did not tell me you wear women’s dress.”

“Blister me, y’don’t tell people such things!”

“Why not? You see me in men’s dress, oh, much! Oh, Rupert, I would so like to go there with some other women who would like to wear breeches. What fun that was—they did not know if I was Leon or Leonie!”

“At least they didn’t know you was the Duchess of Avon,” Rupert said grimly, as he hailed a passing hackney. “And thank Providence you don’t know any such women. Fan would be scandalized, but what harrows my soul is what Avon would say.”

Leonie put her head to one side. “I think Monseigneur might laugh. But no, he might not think it enough respectable. Me, I do not see why not.”

“Leonie,” Lord Rupert remonstrated, thoroughly exasperated. “One of these days, sooner than later the way that boy of yours is going, you will wind up a grandmother.”

“ _Oui!_ And I shall lend to my granddaughter my breeches, and teach her the fence. You know that Monseigneur has seen to it that I am _ver-ry_ good.”

“He would,” Rupert said bitterly.

Leonie gave him her sunniest smile. “ _Voila!_ Where do we go next? Did Madame Rosette have clues?”

Rupert said, “From what I can gather, Ffolliot has been kicked out of half the molly houses in London. And t’regular houses as well. It seems to make no difference, male or female, who he . . . practices upon. But she thinks there’s a flogging house in Martlet’s Court, Bow Street, or at Little Swan-Alley, Coleman-Street, and you ain’t going in,” he said severely. “ _Much_ rougher than Madam Ticklecheek, where all is in play, so to speak. Rosette said  . . . well, never you mind what she said.”

“Flogging? _Fouetter—flagellation_?”

“That’s right.”

“People pay money to have that done to them?” she asked incredulously. “Jean beat me, oh, so much. And I never once liked it.”

“That’s right—more to the point here, to do it to others. She said some of the boys in Coleman-Street in particular hire out, no questions asked.”

“ _Diable!”_ Leonie’s voice hardened. “Is this what that pig Ffolliot tries to do to my Vidal?”

“I never told you, but there was some scandal about young Ffolliot when he was just out of school. Couldn’t have been much above sixteen, there was something about his using a withy whip on a two-penny whore before he could, ah, finish. Left her for dead, after. She died of her wounds before they found her.”

 Leonie uttered an imprecation in gutter French, then added firmly, “I do not want Monseigneur to know. It would kill him! Oh, so much. We must hurry.”

“Devil a bit,” Rupert said, but ruefully added, “Except between chairmen and grasping porters, I’ve run out of guineas.”

“But I have not,” Leonie said. “I bethought me of such things. For an adventure, one must have a sword, and these.” Her small hand dived into one of the capacious coat pockets, and pulled out a silken purse that clinked promisingly.

“I wish you _had_ been born a boy, stap me if I don’t,” Rupert said feelingly.

o0o

 

Avon’s reputation was such that, though the topic of conversation in White’s was obvious, it vanished like the morning frost when the sun emerges, as he strolled into the gaming rooms. He surveyed the company through his quizzing glass, and greeted those he knew with his customary urbanity.

“Dammit, that’s Satanas,” an older man said to Lord Carlisle and Sir Roger. “His cub could blow up Parliament and he’d stroll in here as cool as you please.” He bowed, as the Duke seemed to be strolling toward them.

Greetings—introductions—and in the flurry over a change around one of the tables, somehow Sir Roger found himself addressed by the suave older man. “Sir Roger, I believe we met once before, at Eton?”

Sir Roger had only met the duke briefly, as intimidated as he felt now, but he bowed acquiescence, to be surprised by a gentle invitation, “A hand of piquet?”

One did not say no to the Duke of Avon, and so they found themselves presently seated in a secluded corner table that happened to be waiting for them. His grace dealt the cards, which permitted Sir Roger to lead the play, and for a minute or two there was no sound but the snap of the cards, and the quiet murmur of voices from other players, punctuated by an occasional laugh or exclamation from the farther rooms.

Presently the Duke said, “I understand that you were present for the unfortunate _contretemps_ yestereve?”

Sir Roger did not know what to say. He glanced uneasily to meet an acute gray gaze. Then Avon said, “Permit me to assure you that I am not seeking a report on the unfortunate events. Merely, I wish to inquire if, during your school days, your acquaintanceship included our young friend, Mr. Ffolliot?”

Sir Roger flushed. “I’ve known him all my life. Our fathers were in school together, too.”

He waited uncomfortably, but the duke turned over a card, then asked about Charles James Fox—bestowing light compliments on that young gentleman’s shining parts—which led to reminiscences about Fox’s attainments at Eton.

Somehow that led to Fox’s journey to the continent, and his return, whereupon he amazed the scholars with the latest French fashion, idiom, and experience . . . and how it was Ffolliot who peached on him to Dr. Barnard, with the result that the director flogged Fox.

“But what they didn’t know was that Ffolliot had found a hole where an old door had been plastered over, and he used to invite his particular friends to watch the floggings. When Fox got tickled up, Ffolliot invited a whole crowd, and word got out. That’s when . . .”

“When he and my son sustained a disagreement?”

Sir Roger sighed. He hadn’t meant to bear tales, but somehow one story led to another, as the game progressed, and the duke was a good listener—he neither moralized nor swore. So Sir Roger said frankly, “Vidal thrashed him for blabbing it all over. Fox never knew about the thrashing,” he added. “Everyone went _tace_ after that.”

“So this explains the enmity between Ffolliot and my son. But you remained friends with our so-volatile friend? I congratulate you.”

“I stayed friends with everyone, pretty much.” Sir Roger was uncomfortable again. “I felt sorry for Ffolliot, if you want to know the truth. He was, well, the way he was, but one year I went down for the short vac to the encampment, which was near my home that year. My father had talked of buying me a cornetcy and sending me off to the colonies for a time, as he had a notion that the military might be a way to make me . . . well, I digress. The General—he was a Colonel then. He was fond of the rod, you could say. The least breach of discipline, and he lined everyone up on parade, and bent the miscreant over an artillery piece, and gave them ten, twenty, even fifty cuts, on the bare breech. Ffolliot was not exempt, though he was a boy. I lost any taste for the military life after witnessing that.”

The duke’s expression did not change, and he led the talk toward the military, the colonies, Mr. Thomas Jefferson, and somehow the game ended more quickly than Sir Roger had thought one could. Then the duke thanked him for the excellent hand, gravely paid the small sum he’d lost, and was gone with a rustle of silk.

When Sir Roger rejoined his friends, Carlisle said, “The great Satanas honored you with a hand of cards! What did he talk about? Did he moralize over his son?”

“Barely mentioned him. We talked about the colonies. Jefferson. Eton.”

“That’s our Satanas,” someone said, quizzing glass raised. “Cold as an icicle.”

Fox said, “I wonder where Vidal is. Shall we stroll over the Boodle’s and see if he’s there?”

o0o

 

Vidal woke up to white and yellow pain all along his arms, his head a cannon ball of glowing red torment.  Blue twinges resolved into the icy touch of wet fabric against his flesh. Someone had flung water over him; he could feel it dripping through his hair and off his chin. His head hung lower than his shoulders—his arms were stretched out to either side, held against something cold and metal.

His body had been flung over something barrel-round. Ice cold. Metal?

“What God proposes,” came Ffolliot’s voice, “man disposes.”

Colby’s raucous laugh sent more pain through Vidal’s head.

“You have transgressed against polite society, my lord marquis,” Ffolliot said from somewhere behind. “I will do you the honor of administering punishment myself.”

Vidal jerked against the strong hands holding his wrists against the metal.  From the feel, there was a strong man at either hand. Their determined grip ground his wrist bones against metal, shooting agony through him. But something at his waist dug into his hip: the pistol was still there, hidden in his waistband.

Once again Colby brayed a laugh.

“It will give me great pleasure,” Ffolliot continued. His voice thickened. “Great pleasure indeed to see the red flow on your beautiful white bum, making it hot and slick for my terse to ram up to the hilt, again and again. Oh, my steel is hardening at the thought! Tell me, what is it doing to yours? Because I want you to know what is coming. Does it make you hard, too, my very dear Vidal?”

“ _I’m_ ready, or should I say, I’m randy,” Colby put in, causing a general laugh.

Vidal noted the positions of each voice; Colby, he could place by the stench of sour wine.

“And after I have finished, my gentle friends may have as many turns as they like, and I shall watch. Your punishment thus becomes my pleasure.”

Vidal ‘s gut clenched. Buggery he shrugged at—some, like his old friend Pettigrew, had a preference for it. He suspected his own father and Mr. Davenant had had some sort of connection before her grace entered their lives, and he knew some things about Uncle Rupert. But that was their inclination. He had no choice here.

He flexed his leg muscles. He was suspended over something, his feet off the ground. But he could kick. It would have to be at the right moment, but then what? He had to distract Ffolliot somehow, for as soon as the madman ripped his trousers down, there would go the pistol.

Vidal blinked against the pain. His mouth tasted vile, but at least emptying his belly had cleared his head.

“Have you anything to say?” Ffolliot had taken a step directly behind Vidal. “You do not speak! Hitherto you have always had something to say.”

Here was his chance to fight for time. “Let me go—fight me fair.”

The withy cane flicked the long tail of hair lying against Vidal’s back. “Why would that give me pleasure? Don’t you see that we are here at my pleasure? Whatever comes of a duel, what would they say in town, when we catch up with the rest of my guests?  I am certain they are at Boodles by now, having unaccountably lost us, but they will be waiting for the result of our encounter. Should we bring them word of another duel? Eh, how tedious. I want all London to be full of the news of my pleasures tonight, served upon the body of the Marquis of Vidal. Just as all Eton whispered about your thrashing me. Now, that is what I call justice.”

Vidal flexed his leg muscles. Whatever happened, he would fight until they killed him. If he could provoke Ffolliot enough, _he might kill me outright._

On this angry, desperate thought Vidal readied himself, then the Colonel said, “Eh? I thought you said this camp was deserted.”

“It is,” Ffolliot said. “The regiment shifted down to Newcastle last week, and the new muster isn’t due for . . .”

But there was the sound of horses somewhere in the distance. Vidal sucked in breath to shout for help, but the sound of the horses was too far off. Everyone had gone still, as the distant coach galloped in what sounded like a wide circle—

“Now!”

This new voice came from the other side—from behind Ffolliot and his party. “Hi, there, rascal—”

 _Uncle Rupert?_

The meaty thunk of a cane hitting flesh, and Colby’s enraged howl, was followed by the metallic rasp of steel, then the clang of swordplay.

“To me, to me,” Colby cried as he fumbled for his greatcoat, which contained his pistol. But Rupert was belaboring him with his cane, obstructing the search. “Kill that damned boy, and run this old bugger through!”

“I can’t, damn you,” the Colonel roared, as he backed up steadily. He was a strong man, but had drunk his two bottles in anticipation of the night’s sport—and he had not practiced for an age. “He’s  . . . too . . . fast!”

Ffolliot looked from one to another, then gave an inarticulate cry of rage, and raised his withy cane. He would not be denied his pleasures! White lightning struck Vidal across his back as Ffolliot hit him with the cane again and again.

But as the Colonel gave a groan, followed by violent cursing, the hands holding Vidal’s wrists abruptly vanished, followed by the thud of running feet: the hired lackeys, seeing the Colonel wounded, decided that their wages did not include risking their own skins.

Vidal kicked backward violently. His heel glanced off Ffolliot’s knee. Ffolliot gave a hiss, and the withy whistled ineffectively by Vidal’s ear as he rolled off the rusty iron . . .   _artillery piece?_

He stumbled to one knee, his legs unsteady, his fingers like sausages as he stared up into Ffolliot’s moonlit face.

His hand closed around the pistol.

At nearly nineteen, Vidal had fought two duels. Both were with other boys, and he remembered the blotchy red in pale faces, jaw muscles clenching, mouths a thin line. Anger—wildness—the thrum of hot blood through shoulders, arms, hands. Through his vitals and limbs, down to the spurs on his heels—ready to trip him if he wasn’t wary.

The hot words, and then the steady hand, the trigger squeezed between heartbeats. One shot in the arm, the other in the shoulder when he flinched. Anger flared bright, then died as suddenly: he never wanted to kill.

But as Ffolliot brought the cane down directly toward Vidal’s face, he steadied the pistol, and shot for the heart.

Ffolliot spun around, head flung back. The cane flew from his pale fingers as his wide blue eyes sought the sky. Then he thumped to the ground.

Vidal straightened up dizzily to find a tableau: Rupert and a boy in old-fashioned court dress faced off Colby and the Colonel, the latter clutching one shoulder tightly.

Colby waved a pistol between Rupert and the boy, who glanced his way. Moonlight fell full on a dear, familiar face— _Maman?_

“Move and I shoot,” Colby said.

“You have one shot,” Rupert said, swinging his cane. “And then I’m going to be on you.”

“Both,” said her grace.

As Vidal slowly rose to his feet, his joints a-tremble, the pistol loose in his still-tingling fingers, there came the sound of a deliberate step.

Everyone looked up as a moonlit figure emerged from beyond some piled rubble: tall, light pooling along the smooth lines of his silken coat, and glinting on the elegant pistols leveled in each hand.

There was a gasp, and Leonie exclaimed, “Mon-seign-eur!” Each syllable conveyed a different emotion: amazement, question—and delight.

“You’re too late, Avon, to keep your cub from hanging,” the Colonel rasped. “He’s murdered Ffolliot.”

“It desolates me,” Avon said, as he took in the honeycombed artillery-piece; his son, swaying and bruised even in the dim light; the Colonel with blood seeping from his shoulder and the faint glint along Leonie’s sword; Colby and Rupert, one with a pistol, the other brandishing his cane. The fallen Ffolliot, withy-cane loose in his fingers. “It desolates me to correct you, sir, but I believe that Mr. Ffolliot lost a duel. You and Mr. . . . Colby, I apprehend? Yes. Mr. Colby acted as seconds.”

“You can threaten all you like,” said the Colonel, “but I know the truth. Either you shoot us both, and our witnesses are running back to town—”

“Alas, I mistook your servants for footpads,” Avon corrected gently. “Running at my coach in the darkness.” He gestured slightly with the pistols. “Though I greatly deplore their lack of finesse, I, like my son, never miss.”

“The hirelings may be dead, but I know what I saw.”

“If Monseigneur says that you saw a duel, you saw a duel,” Leonie declared. “Me, I saw five cowards about to r-r-rape a young man. I know this word, me! You see I can speak truth, too. I can also speak about how one of these cowards lost a fight to a woman.” She snatched off her wig, allowing ruddy curls to tumble down onto her shoulders. “This story would tell well in London, about how a duchess pinked a military man?”

“It don’t redound to _your_ credit, duchess,” Colby blustered, when the Colonel remained silent. “How many doors will open to a woman running around in breeches?”

Leonie tossed her head. “When the Duchess of Avon runs around in breeches defeating cowards, ah bah! The world listens to her.”

Avon interjected, “There is another aspect to consider, sir.” He addressed the Colonel. “You, no doubt, will be obligated to report the death of his son to the General. Is that gentleman going to hear about a duel at the site of the General’s late encampment, a duel honorably witnessed, or a sordid tale of . . . we understand one another, I believe?”

The Colonel bowed ironically. “I take it you have a coach waiting somewhere out of sight? If you will convey us back to town, so that I might begin seeing to the obligations you name, we may consider our business complete.”

“Our business is concluded now,” the duke replied, holding a handkerchief to his nose as his gaze rested on Colby. “You may reflect upon the exigencies on your walk back to town.”

Rupert moved to Vidal. “Here’s an arm,” he said.

“I can walk,” Vidal said, gritting his teeth. And in a lower voice, “Thank you, Uncle.”

o0o

 

Vidal endured the ride back to Avon House, where the lights were still glowing, the party still going on. Mr. Davenant had exerted himself successfully.

Leonie had chattered during the beginning of the ride, telling Avon of their adventures, while she gripped one of Vidal’s hands tightly in hers. “ _A vrai dire_ , I so wanted to save you from finding out,” she admitted. “I thought it would hurt you, oh, much, to know what this beast Ffolliot intended.”

 _“Peccata patris_ ,” murmured his grace.

Rupert, exasperated at Avon’s proclivity for spouting unintelligible witticisms, exclaimed, “Rabbit it, we had quite an adventure. Now I’m for home, a tankard of ale, and bed. Blister me, I’m getting too old for careering all over the countryside.”

“Rupert, your heroism has me at your feet,” Avon drawled, amused. “But I beg you exert yourself once more before this night closes. We will stop at your lodging, but only long enough for you to change your coat. Then we shall return, and resume our places at the party as if nothing has occurred.”

“Do you think this r-r-r-rascal of a colonel will say what you told him?”

“The General’s temperament is well known. By the end of his long walk, I trust that the Colonel will see the wisdom of retailing events exactly as I outlined.”

They pulled up in Half Moon Street, and Rupert let himself out, saying, “Don’t wait up. I’ll take a hackney and join you. I think we should raise a glass to us, stap me if I don’t.”  He waved, and the coach rolled on.

When they reached the Avon House stable yard, Leonie kissed her son, then her husband, and alighted, saying softly, “I go in the back Leon, and walk into the salon a duchess. An adventure with a good end is _fort amusant_. I feel young again.”

Vidal ached from skull to heels; remaining upright took all his will. But he managed. “I have clothing in my old rooms,” he said. “I will also put in an appearance.”

In the uncertain light from the lanterns hanging in the stable, Avon surveyed his son’s bruised face. “You will not be seen by the company tonight,” he said gently. “You will, I entreat, go directly upstairs, where I will have Gaston see to a hot bath, and a meal. Then, perhaps, a night of sleep? And tomorrow, you and I will ride down to Avon for some sport shooting, until the telltale marks on your countenance have healed.”

“As you command, sir.” Vidal managed to bow with a hint of irony; Avon smiled privately at his bravado.

A few hours later, he trod upstairs, to discover Vidal in bed, but he was not asleep. He scowled at the fire leaping on the grate. In spite of the swellings and discolorations on his face, his eyes were much clearer. But their expression was somber.

“I believe I have to thank you, sir,” he began.

“It is your mother and your uncle who put themselves to truly heroic effort,” Avon said.

Vidal’s grin flashed. “I think Maman enjoyed herself. And pinking that damned cur . . . I wish she’d run him through. He and Colby were in it all along—damn it, they stood by and watched Ffolliot cheat at cards. They all did—there were more of ‘em. I don’t say they knew what Ffolliot was up to, but they conspired in a cheat. And though Ffolliot paid for his part, Colby and that damned redcoat walked away free.”

Avon could see that the injustice of the events disturbed his son at least as much as the violence.

“I suspect there were political motivations for the first part. You are known to be friends with young Fox, who is by no means out of circles of power. One of his causes now is the corruption practiced by such as General Ffolliot—if I do not mistake, Fox’s sympathies are veering toward the colonials. But you and I have little investment in politics, so let me leave that subject in order to make this observation: the two who walked away will not completely escape the consequences of their actions.”

“How so, sir?”

“The General will not welcome the messenger who brings news of his son’s death, and in that I can sympathize. Even a story about a fair duel will not preserve the Colonel from a father’s wrath. I suspect the General will hold his subordinate responsible for the result of said duel, and our friend will, no doubt, shortly find himself in an unenviable post.”

Vidal said, “I hope so. But Colby’s out of military reach.”

“Mr. Colby, in spite of his great wealth, is not popular. There are bound to be whispers and smiles if he appears with his face so battered. A murmur about his part in said affair—perhaps a whisper about unfair play, which as you experienced, did transpire—should be enough to close doors to him, to employ his own words. I might drop a suggestion to those who have influence with Mr. Colby senior to send his son to their West Indies holdings, which I understand are in a state of turmoil far more dramatic than that of the colonies farther north.”

“He’s a fiend,” Vidal said.

“Yes, and a fiend put in charge of slaves who are in a state of rebellion often suffers a summary end,” Avon said. “Though there is too seldom justice in this world, I trust that in this instance, it will be found.”

Vidal’s long fingers played restlessly over the bedclothes. “I killed a man tonight, sir.”

“You did.”

“You said _Peccata patris._ I remember enough of my Latin to translate that: _the sins of the father_. Is that aimed at me, or at Ffolliot?”

“The world may say what it likes about Satanas and his cub. My observation is confined to the Ffolliots,” Avon said. “To be blunt, I believe the son was mad, and would only get worse. But it was the General who made him that way. Your sins, my son, are yet to be committed. I trust they will not be too great, before you learn wisdom.”

A flash of his old temper widened Vidal’s eyes, then he grinned ruefully. “My sins. And how, sir, am I to take _that_?”

“With a modicum of grace, my dear boy,” said Avon, smiling. “As in all things, with a modicum of grace.”

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Edo no Hana for brainstorming with me on a sticky transition.
> 
> And thanks to my recipient for the sort of prompt I love, and I hope I give satisfaction.


End file.
